Engaging students with culturally authentic texts and academic content is essential to developing academic language and literacy skills. However, such cognitively demanding activities pose significant challenges for beginning learners. This session provides practical strategies for scaffolding language and literacy skills in the interpretive mode.
Session Content
The purpose of this session is to demonstrate how scaffolding can be used as a tool to successfully address challenges and misconceptions associated with reading in the target language. The session will first begin by analyzing the cognitive demands of reading. Second, it will demonstrate how to make culturally authentic texts more accessible to students. Third, presenters will model how to embed interactive reading strategies into interpretive tasks to help students become more independent readers. Fourth, participants will experience strategies for engaging students with the academic content of texts, with examples in Spanish, French, and German. Finally, the session will demonstrate practical strategies for scaffolding interpersonal activities in ways that allow students to communicate about academic content in the target language. The session will conclude with time for questions, answers, and idea sharing.
Can Do Statements
1) I can identify the cognitive demands of reading in the target language, clarify common misconceptions, and use scaffolding to help students overcome typical challenges.
2) I can embed interactive reading strategies into interpretive tasks to help students become independent readers.
3) I can engage students in communicating about the academic content of texts by scaffolding interpersonal activities for students.
- A contemporary definition and key characteristics of literacy pertaining to world language education in the 21st century provided by ACTFL
- Includes an excellent infographic that outlines a useful process and question prompts for preparing learners for OPIs in the world language classroom
Table of Contents
Session Description
Engaging students with culturally authentic texts and academic content is essential to developing academic language and literacy skills. However, such cognitively demanding activities pose significant challenges for beginning learners. This session provides practical strategies for scaffolding language and literacy skills in the interpretive mode.
Session Content
The purpose of this session is to demonstrate how scaffolding can be used as a tool to successfully address challenges and misconceptions associated with reading in the target language. The session will first begin by analyzing the cognitive demands of reading. Second, it will demonstrate how to make culturally authentic texts more accessible to students. Third, presenters will model how to embed interactive reading strategies into interpretive tasks to help students become more independent readers. Fourth, participants will experience strategies for engaging students with the academic content of texts, with examples in Spanish, French, and German. Finally, the session will demonstrate practical strategies for scaffolding interpersonal activities in ways that allow students to communicate about academic content in the target language. The session will conclude with time for questions, answers, and idea sharing.
Can Do Statements
1) I can identify the cognitive demands of reading in the target language, clarify common misconceptions, and use scaffolding to help students overcome typical challenges.
2) I can embed interactive reading strategies into interpretive tasks to help students become independent readers.
3) I can engage students in communicating about the academic content of texts by scaffolding interpersonal activities for students.
Activities
Articles
10 frases célebres de Christopher Lee
Handouts
Images
Reading Infographic
PowerPoint
Professional Resources
Scaffolding Reading Comprehension in a Foreign Language Class - A blog post from Flippin' with Kirsch that outlines how a team of teachers used a variety of free, web 2.0 technology tools to help learners in a Spanish 3 class read a novel.
The Go-to Strategies: Scaffolding Options for Teachers of English Language Learners - Grounded in 5 excellent core principles for scaffolding, this resource book identifies 78 strategies
Tech Tools
Videos
The Danger of a Single Story
The Time You Have in Jellybeans
Water is Life